Two weeks before I left for Japan, we had a crapton of rain, and I found a huge puddle in the basement. I took a bunch of pictures, sent them to the contractor, and asked him to contact the folks who’d done the crack-sealing a few months earlier.

Three months later, I discover that the reason they never came out to take a look was that they needed to see the wall wet, and the contractor was waiting for me to call them the next time it was actively leaking (a message that never reached me…). Meanwhile the landscapers had completely redone the drainage outside, so even if I’d been told about this requirement, it wasn’t going to be easy to reproduce.

So this morning the contractor brought over a hose and set it to soak the ground in the right area. Pretty soon we had a slow leak and a fast one, to the point that you could hear the water splashing on the floor from twenty feet away. Now they’re going to come out and do something about it.

Spring anime?

Not too promising so far. The first season of Edens Zero was fun, but I know from the source material that it basically turns into an endless series of escalating fight scenes. And I’m not convinced that Megumin and Yunyun can carry a Konosuba prequel. Other than that, lots of Nth seasons of shows I didn’t watch, convoluted plots that require giant expository dumps to setup, the usual variations on isekai cheats, and things that announce that they’re funny by SHOUTING EVERY LINE.

The goofiest 9mm ammo

It’s amazing what you can find in boxes that haven’t been opened in 30 years.

Before I moved to California in the early Nineties, I bought some reloads from a little hole-in-the-wall gun shop in Columbus, Ohio. They were fun to shoot, but only if you had a gun that they worked in. In fact, he wouldn’t even sell them to you unless you told him you owned one of the few guns that could feed them reliably.

My Ruger P-85 (sold off long ago, pity) was on the short list; that gun was a garbagemouth that would feed anything, including empty cases, so it was a natural for these ribbed semi-wadcutters:

I doubt he’s still in business, and I’m quite certain I don’t remember where his shop was.

Carnival Row

I had meant to watch this Amazon series a while back, but just never got into the mood. Then I noticed that they’re in the middle of releasing season two, so I sat down and gave it a shot.

Perhaps the most interesting thing about it is that it’s not based on existing IP, and yet got a fairly large budget, decent casting, and dubbing into quite a few languages; it’s clear that Amazon really wanted it to succeed.

The first season mostly does, although the two major story arcs are almost completely separate, and the secondary one is about as subtle as a brick to the back of the head. Unfortunately, so far, the second season is a kitchen sink to the back of the head, full of political intrigue, secret meetings, a triple helping of fantasy racism allegory, another mystery monster, a ridiculous guillotine, and workers of the world uniting.

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